printing 35mm sizes?

new to printing, I have been printing this week for the first time in an organize way many of my hundreds 35mm negatives. I am new to this, so many questions coming into my head. The main one is the size. I am using 8x10 paper. In order to see the entire negative image into the paper the size I keep coming to is about 6,25x9,75 a bit smaller than that. If I want the image to cover all the surface of 8x10 in the paper I have to keep out of the paper part of the negative.

I am using an Omega D2v, a minolta 50mm lens and I believe all the enlarger pieces are like they are supposed to be.

On 11x14 paper I setup my blades at 6" x 9" because it is easy to remember. That seems to give a nice presentation. Then I tweak a little based on the camera/negative I am printing as the image size can vary slightly from camera to camera.

For 8x10 paper I start at 4"x 6", again because it is easy to remember, then tweak from there.

I assume you have a 4 blade easel. If you don't have one, then you will be left with an odd presentation or (if you trim the paper) an odd paper size.

Last edited by ic-racer; 12-14-2010 at 08:11 PM. Click to view previous post history.

Another approach would be to print smaller. If you cut 8x10 in half, you end up with two sheets of 5x8. Your 35mm negative will fill up a 5x7.5 sheet nicely, leaving a 1/2 inch for test strips.

Matt

“Photography is a complex and fluid medium, and its many factors are not applied in simple sequence. Rather, the process may be likened to the art of the juggler in keeping many balls in the air at one time!”

Ansel Adams, from the introduction to The Negative - The New Ansel Adams Photography Series / Book 2

Obviously, there is no ways to print 35mm negative to fill the entire space available on 8x10 paper. 35mm frame is 2:3 aspect ratio. (24mm by 36mm I think?) So that only thing you can do is to either use 4 blade easel or make a mask out of cardboard (this is what I do) and settle on wasting some space on paper or not print entire frame on the negative.

Since I do not have a 4 blade easel, I made several cardboard windows that covers 8x10 paper but have a smaller window opening. I tape this to back of my "quick easel" and print. Cheap and works well.

What are you going to do with your prints? Keep it in folder? Frame them? Keep them in box? That usually dictates what size you'd want to print and even printing full frame is feasible. Most of the time, I end up cropping mine.

I am using a two blade easel that got for free, I bought a bunch of mats from an art place and was intending to use them the size of the mats are 11x14 with 7,5x9,5 opening so that gave a bad vibe about what is going on with my sizing, I can't get those measurements! I guess I will have to learn how to make my own mats because sometimes I could crop and get the image all the way to 8x10 but other times I had to cut half of an important part of the image. Thanks for the tips!

The size of mat you have is for 8x10 prints. If you have an 8x10 paper, your normal size border will be about 1/4" on all sides. That will give you 7.5x9.5 size image on 8x10 size paper.

There are several ways of doing this but one way is to shoot with ultimate printing size (aspect ratio) in mind. If you have to work with existing negatives, then your only choices are to find cropping that will work with the image, or as you say custom cut the mat. There are on-line sources that will do it for you relatively inexpensively.

i hate to sound clueless ...
but if you want to print " full bleed " / no border
why don't you just print to the size you have
been printing and trim the images ?
a full 35mm negative is about 2" short no matter
which side you hope to get "full" ..

I am using a two blade easel that got for free, I bought a bunch of mats from an art place and was intending to use them the size of the mats are 11x14 with 7,5x9,5 opening so that gave a bad vibe about what is going on with my sizing, I can't get those measurements! I guess I will have to learn how to make my own mats because sometimes I could crop and get the image all the way to 8x10 but other times I had to cut half of an important part of the image. Thanks for the tips!

Jaime:

This is where you get to practice in-camera cropping .

If you have a pre-ordained aspect ratio you need to print to, the best way to do it is to take it into account when you are first composing the shot.

Reminds me of wedding work .

Matt

“Photography is a complex and fluid medium, and its many factors are not applied in simple sequence. Rather, the process may be likened to the art of the juggler in keeping many balls in the air at one time!”

Ansel Adams, from the introduction to The Negative - The New Ansel Adams Photography Series / Book 2